Pension Funds Are Hooked on Private Equity, No Matter the Risks Bloomberg
The Olympics
More main character energy:
insane aura
51-yr old Yusuf Dikec of Turkey shows up to the Olympics for shooting without special lenses…
without ear protection…
hand in his pocket & both eyes open…
and casually takes home a silver medal pic.twitter.com/qRB3kwRZmz
— Warren Sharp (@SharpFootball) July 31, 2024
Climate
Probability Estimates of a 21st Century AMOC Collapse (preprint) arXiv
Cautious Optimism In Helen Scales’ ‘What The Wild Sea Can Be: The Future Of The World’s Ocean’ 3 Quarks Daily
“Where am I going to live?”: Questions for Colorado doctors amid choking smoke and ozone Colorado Sun
Wildfire smoke may be worse for brain health than other air pollution, dementia research finds PBS
Mother Nature’s Punching Bag Vermont Political Observer
Can the moon help preserve Earth’s endangered species? Space.com
Syndemics
Bird flu: Even Rassmussen understands there’s a problem
There's a big problem with the way the US is responding to the H5N1 cattle outbreak.
Samples are not being tested in a timely manner (months later) and then these results are not being disclosed in a timely manner (again, months later) either.
This outbreak is not containable. https://t.co/YkoYLCczsn
— Dr. Angela Rasmussen (@angie_rasmussen) July 31, 2024
CDC: $5 Million Initiative to Improve Uptake of Seasonal Flu Shots For Livestock Workers Avian Flu Diary. “But given the downsides, it makes sense to try to reduce the the opportunities for a reassortment event that might provide H5N1 with a pathway to human adaptation.”
Victoria’s new ‘clean air’ project could help end the COVID pandemic and boost productivity ABC Australia
Good on ya, The West Australian:
🇦🇺 Cough, Cough, Cough
▫Whooping cough cases surge in WA’s South West
▫@kirovkate
▫https://t.co/2FU4Mt6IqB 👈#frontpagestoday #Australia @westaustralian 🇦🇺 pic.twitter.com/OmvXfnilLi— 𝙵𝚛𝚘𝚗𝚝 𝙿𝚊𝚐𝚎𝚜 𝚃𝚘𝚍𝚊𝚢 📰 (@ukpapers) July 30, 2024
Covid-19 Pauses Outer Cape Entertainment The Provincetown Independent
Is it heatstroke or COVID? Central Japan emergency medical responders on high alert The Mainichi. ‘Tis a mystery!
Long-term effects of COVID-19 on endothelial function, arterial stiffness, and blood pressure in college students: a pre-post-controlled study BMC Infectious Diseases. From the Abstract: “Our study demonstrated that COVID-19 has long-term detrimental effects on vascular function in college students. However, arterial stiffness tends to improve over time, while [Blood Pressure (BP)] may exhibit the opposite trend.”
Institutional COVID denial has killed public health as we knew it. Prepare to lose several centuries of progress. The Guantlet
China?
Caixin Explains: Why and How China’s Overhauling Monetary Policy (Part 1) Caixin Global. Commentary:
4/7
difficult for the central bank to influence other interest rates — in the money market and in bank lending. The PBOC is also trying to control too many interest rates and in the process is often sending conflicting or mixed signals to the markets."— Michael Pettis (@michaelxpettis) August 1, 2024
Chinese premier calls for ‘tangible, effective, accessible’ policies to aid economy South China Morning Post
China’s Robotaxi Dreams Spark Economic Anxiety Over AI’s Threat Bloomberg
Understanding Japanese Unionism: The Shuntō System in Context Nippon.com
India
50 jobs, 30 years: The unseen labour of an Indian female worker BBC
‘New wave’: Why suspected rebel attacks are rising in Kashmir’s Jammu area Al Jazeera
The Great Game
Navigating the Middle: Georgia’s strategic position in the Middle Corridor among EU and China JAM News
Syraqistan
Prof. John J. Mearsheimer: Netanyahu’s Grave Mistakes (video “Live IN EIGHT HOURS,” “August 1 at 3:00 PM”) Judge Napolitano, YouTube. Lambert here: Normally, I’d wait until tomorrow to run this, but the topic is a matter of some urgency and Mearsheimer’s views are valuable. A query:
The Middle East is on the verge of massive escalation involving several countries.
The Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin, vowed that the US would intervene in the war to protect Israel.
But neither the President nor VP have said a word about this. Who is running the US Govt? pic.twitter.com/lw1mC10Ozf
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) July 31, 2024
* * * Storming Sde Teiman, Far-right Lawmakers Try to Inject Chaos Into the Israeli Army Haaretz
Israel Is Already Over Alon Mizrahi
* * * The Murder of Ismail Haniyeh Patrick Lawrence, Scheer Post
Israel’s spies take their revenge FT
Israel Has a History of Killing Hamas Leaders Who Are Trying To Secure Ceasefires Mehdi Hasan, Zeteo
Yemen’s Houthi leader warns of severe consequences for Israel over Hamas chief’s assassination Anadolu Agency
Haniyeh killing in Iran risks dragging US into war it says it doesn’t want Al Jazeera
* * * Troubled by Google Maps Reviews Crooked Timber
* * * WHO chief Tedros says polio detected in Gaza, appeals for action Straits Times. Meanwhile:
CDC is thrilled to support Team End Polio! Visit https://t.co/w70HvUTekj and join us in the fight against this devastating, preventable disease so we can #EndPolio. pic.twitter.com/7MQQb3F0Wy
— Mandy K. Cohen, MD, MPH (@CDCDirector) July 31, 2024
Dear Old Blighty
What will the comfortable classes do? Funding the Future
New Not-So-Cold War
Intensity of Russian attacks growing: 156 combat engagements across combat zone over past day Ukrainska Pravda
A Personal Discussion of Russian National Security Counterpunch
Ukraine receives first F-16 fighter jets to bolster defenses against Russia, officials tell AP AP
* * * Voting Against Nuclear War Scott Ritter, Consortium News
Ukraine’s Zelensky says he wants Russia ‘at the table’ for next peace summit France24
* * * Gershkovich reportedly released in massive Russian political prisoner swap BNE Intellinews
Russia : Music and Locomotives Pressenza
2024
Trump vs. NABJ: Hostility and questions about journalism FOX
Big Law rallies around Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign FT
Checking the Checkers: “Border Czar” (excerpt) Matt Taibbi, Racket News
Digital Watch
Tesla that killed motorcyclist was in Full Self-Driving mode The Register
Inside the WSJ’s Investigation of Tesla’s Autopilot Crash Risks WSJ
Copyright Office tells Congress: ‘Urgent need’ to outlaw AI-powered impersonation TechCrunch
Why I Finally Quit Spotify The New Yorker
Why the CrowdStrike bug hit banks hard Bits About Money
Healthcare
Medical Bills Catch Almost Half of Insured US Adults by Surprise Bloomberg
Boeing
Boeing Hires Kelly Ortberg as Its Next CEO WSJ
Boeing names new CEO; losses widen, negative cash flow again. Update 1, reaction. Leeham News and Analysis
In new CEO, Boeing gets ‘the kind of person who gives a damn’ FT
The Final Frontier
No, Boeing Starliner’s NASA astronauts are not stranded in space. Here’s why. Space.com
Imperial Collapse Watch
The Army Bet $11M on The Rock and UFL Ginning Up Enlistments. It May Have Actually Hurt Recruiting Efforts military.com
Class Warfare
How Thousands of Middlemen Are Gaming the H-1B Program Bloomberg
From Folkway to Art: The Transformation of Quilts JSTOR
Researchers introduce knitted furniture TechXplore
Antidote du jour (Da):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
A HARD CONVERSATION
(melody borrowed from I’ve Been All Around This World by The Grateful Dead)
Two hundred years and countin’ ain’t this country grand?
My two legs got blown away in Afghanistan
They gave me a medal the banks got cash in hand
Lord Lord we still don’t rule this world
What the hell might you do to even up that score?
Signed up I was true blue to the nation I fought for
My body is so broken and my mind is full of gore
Lord Lord we still don’t rule this world
(musical interlude)
My nephew went to Ukraine says it’s bad as bad can be
The Pentagon wants war to save Taiwan’s democracy
We’re never gonna stop until the whole damn world is free
Lord Lord we still don’t rule this world
My choice is either civil war or suicide at dawn
Either choice might get some folks to question what goes on
You can read the newspaper to see which way I’ve gone
Lord we still don’t rule this world
Two hundred years and countin’ ain’t this country grand?
I never had a half a chance to grow to be a man
Don’t enlist for college—you’ll die out in the sand
Lord Lord we still don’t rule this world
Mr. Dikec is also a cat person !
https://x.com/OlgaBazova/status/1818950440941203903?t=nO7zl69UWoVr78JMvK1FXg&s=19
Of course he is. An orange cat no less. Dude looks like he stepped out of a Guy Ritchie film.
“Ukraine receives first F-16 fighter jets to bolster defenses against Russia, officials tell AP”
No worries, the Russians are already on it. Their flight crews already have stencils of F-16s made up along with the black spray-paint needed and a Russian company has already offered a 15 million ruble (approximately $170,000) bounty for the first Russian pilot to shoot one of these down-
https://www.eurasiantimes.com/f-16-for-ukraine-russians-offer-170000-bounty/
Meanwhile the manufacturers of the F-16 already have made their PR statements ready to go blaming the Ukrainian pilots for not being good enough for those fighters.
Re Arterial stiffness after COVID. This is an issue I’ve been fighting with the medical doctors for THREE years now. My last GP appointment (Tuesday) had my fave GP acknowledge that this is almost certainly an issue but if she refers me to the appropriate consultant she’ll be told to “bugger off”…..just like like her colleague who tried to get a haematologist to investigate me.
Since my first Sars-COV2 infection (early Feb 2000) when I very nearly ended up ventilated in our plague pit, sorry, regional specialist hospital Emergency Dept, I have experienced four (two in each arm) major ruptures in veins with no explanation in terms of meds/BP/alcohol intake/etc. ONE was due to a trauma (don’t pet feral cats). The rest were spontaneous. Plus I, my sister, and both our biological parents have had repeated bursts of veins in the whites of our eyes. All since Feb 2000.
There’s more than enough data just from our family to get someone looking into this! But they’re simply doing triage of the worst cases round here. The orthopaediac trauma surgeon in April 2023 (who admitted me to hospital for 24 hour I/V antibiotics after the cat bite) said (in no uncertain terms as is the case with most orthopods) “this guy’s internal organs and blood is fine – no clotting issues etc – it’s his veins that are a big big worry”. Yet got outvoted 2-1 when it came to decision to discharge me next day. Nothing has been done to follow-up. GP on Tuesday admitted that “unless your heart CT shows anything odd, I’ll have absolutely no grounds to raise this again, I’m sorry”. At least she’s honest.
2020 doh
fat fingers
You sure have a tough row to hoe, Terry. Any chance of asking around to see if there is another part of the UK you could move to where the doctors there remember how to be actual doctors that can do medicine and stuff? If you, your sister and your parents all share the same condition, that should raise all sorts of red flags. Though to be fair, perhaps all those doctors are triaging because of the slowly increasing number of people that are experiencing long Covid and its assorted manifestations coming into the system. That has got to be a factor.
Many thanks – and also to Carla below.
The sad thing is I now live in a really “socio-economically rubbish part of the UK”. I don’t have alternatives here. Ironically, my “easiest” alternative would be to use my Australian passport and move back down under……I have a couple of very good friends on the East Coast….but I’d be (once again) so isolated from everyone else *sigh*.
Wishing you well too.
Thank you so much for posting this, terrifying as it is. It’s MORE terrifying that the medical establishment–and almost everyone else– is in denial. Wishing you and your family well, Terry.
>Israel’s spies take their revenge FT
Assassinations have for decades been part of the Israeli repertoire. Iranian nuclear scientists have been gunned down on the streets of Tehran, Hamas militants have been poisoned in hotel rooms and torn to shreds by exploding cell phones, and there has been the ever-present threat of drone or air strikes.
Reminds me of a Tweet by Nassim Taleb I read yesterday.
Nassim Nicholas Taleb
@nntaleb
The assassinate in order to exist model is not sustainable
1:50 PM · Jul 31, 2024
“But shouldn’t I, as a Google maps reviewer, be equally free to tell readers that if they don’t like these politics, they might prefer not to eat at this place?”
“Yet I was troubled by two large collection boxes which aim “to provide immediate help for the victims of Hamas terrorism and their families.” As I wrote in the comment that I was not allowed to publish, there are plenty of people, including Jews, who think Israel is currently acting immorally in how it has chosen to respond to the attacks by Hamas. My own view is that a Holocaust memorial should not take sides in a conflict that so deeply divides people (of course, anyone is free to disagree with this view). The group of visitors who might find this troubling includes those who want to pay their respects to holocaust victims by visiting a memorial such as this one, and who think the only way to approach the current tragedy is by trying to see the dehumanization, the massive loss of human lives, and the enormous suffering, on both sides.”
How quaint of Robeyns to object to not being able to write those reviews while insisting that the “dehumanization” and “massive loss of lives” is somehow suffered equally by “both sides.”
Epic fail, Ingrid. Despite all its ghastly machinations, Google is not the problem here.
>A Personal Discussion of Russian National Security – Counterpunch
No industrialized country has been willing to place military goals ahead of social and economic welfare, which isn’t the case regarding Soviet and Russian leaders over the decades. Putin’s war in Ukraine has backfired on every level, not only in Ukraine itself, but has led to a revival of NATO that finds two additional members in Sweden and Finland as well as increased military spending in most of the NATO countries.
I don’t know what has happened to Counterpunch. I stopped going to CP a couple of years ago, right around CV19 event. What does CP think the ~trillion dollars in MIC spending is doing to the U.S.’s “economic welfare.” Has “Putin’s war” (such a silly and immature personalization of Russia’s war) done damage to their economy? How has Russia’s global stature changed since the beginning of the conflict? “Backfired on every level?”
CP needs a reset.
NATO expansion to Finland did not really change the threat to Russia in the north (because Baltics and Norway are already in) but it did severely weaken Finland’s and NATO’s security (1000 km of militarized border).
As well as the whole world’s security once US brings some nuclear capable missiles to Finland to “send a message” and putting a nuclear war a hair trigger away.
I guess that can be defined a s backfired, if Russia was aiming to improve global security.
Several ago they started a beef with Caitlyn Johnstone. Somehow somewhen they got taken over by infiltrators.
I noticed the change soon after Russia invaded Ukraine, when they ran a story about CJ being a Russian agent. That made me recall that they had boasted about getting removed from the Propornot list merely by threatening to sue, which I realized could only have happened if they had deep state connections.
Deleting spotify: well done.
I also appreciate this guy’s attempt to boomerang the entshittification back to Spotify.
”Here the man steps into Spotify’s office and throws poo.
– The algorithms, i.e. the playlists from the streaming services, are ruining my life, he says in police interrogation.
Now the man is charged with serious damage and molestation and is required to pay SEK 330,000.”
Will Spotify be charged too with damage and molestation? Prison time for the WEF-stooge Daniel Ek?
https://www-expressen-se.translate.goog/noje/han-ler-kastar-sedan-bajs-pa-spotifys-kontor/?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=de&_x_tr_pto=wapp
“No, Boeing Starliner’s NASA astronauts are not stranded in space. Here’s why.”
Nice try with this article but I am more ready to believe a story of how Kamala Harris is being readied to undertake a flight mission as an astronaut to bring those two people home aboard a re-conditioned Space Shuttle. Make a good movie though.
Not the first such article we’ve had pushing the same message.
Lethem wrote about astronauts stranded in a space station thanks to failing technology in Chronic City.
Musical interlude:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYYRH4apXDo
The Mearsheimer talk with Napolitano will be five hours after Nasrallah speaks at the funeral of Shukur. There’s a chance Mearsheimer will have to comment events that will be happening as they stream.
Israel has bombed and shelled villages in southern Lebanon today, but Hezbollah has not fired back. There are some indications Hezbollah is making preparations for an actual war breaking out. Southern Lebanese inhabitants are reporting constant buzz of Israeli observation drones.
Iranians are today meeting with representatives from Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen to discuss about the retaliation while Iran has announced yesterday it has no intention of intensifying the conflict.
Some hours ago the funeral of Haniyah in Tehran was a apparently a rarely seen presentation of Shia-Sunni unity against a common enemy.
The missus and I are on European vacation for a few more days. I’ve been largely unplugged and marked safe from greasy, fake AI, having escaped from the tar pit of Atlanta’s airport by the skin of our teeth during the CrowdSuck fiasco Friday.
To quote the late Frank Zappa: the meek shall inherit nothing.
A few observations:
Unplugging is good for your mental health. At the airport now waiting for our flight I am catching up with the News and wishing I hadn’t.
Speaking of airports, they are much nicer and cleaner than the crapified US ones. A ham sandwich goes for around 7 Euros which is about half of the $14 I paid for one at Hartsfield-Jackson last year. So score one for Europe as the screwflation here is at least a bit subdued.
A few of the locals we encountered seemed not so thrilled about the EU. One guide in a Balkan country mentioned that they had good health care provided by the Government. Well, that’s nice, good luck keeping it! The Blackrock scum will no doubt move in and privatize that sucker.
>Sen. Rand Paul questions acting Secret Service director on Trump rally shooting probe
Interesting, if tepid, questioning of SS by Paul yesterday. Mainly covering “failures in protocol.” I still don’t know much about Maxell’s Yearick and his role if any, but I can rest assured that he wasn’t the shooter according to Politifact. But who was he? What was the “white van” all about? Was Crooks the “fall guy.” So many interconnections that independent journalist are tracking down…but the country has moved on, nothing to see, just the incompetence of another gov’t bureaucracy that we’ve all been conditioned to expect and accept.
https://youtu.be/a9mmR-eElQc?si=_cv8p4HHAkrZGm19
https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2024/jul/16/instagram-posts/no-trump-rally-shooter-wasnt-maxwell-yearick/
In What will the comfortable classes do? Richard Murphy makes a point I think super important and applies beyond the UK: the only way to stop vicious right-wing political movements from advancing is to advance populist politics of economic justice.
It’s so obvious as to be banal, but the global elites see it the other way: the only way to stop populist economic policy is to advance vicious, right-wing political movements. It’s not the latter that threatens them but the former.
The Army’s Bet….
Maybe if you tidy up the place a bit…
“For fiscal year 2022, the Pentagon’s Annual Report on Sexual Assault in the Military showed that reported incidents rose 9% in the Navy, 13% in the Air Force and 3.6% in the Marine Corps. While reports in the Army fell 9%, there were still 8,942 reports of sexual assault across the entire force.”
Re escalation in the middle east, Israel is also claiming that their hit on Deif from back in early July in Khan Younis is confirmed. They have confirmed his death numerous times already, so we shall see. It’s possible that some of the released detainees had spyware installed on their phones or somesuch to inform the IOF of a Deif visit.
Regarding the overall picture, I am more stoic about the outcome. The Chinese have a saying that goes something like, ‘who knows what is good or bad?’. It will take a long time for the smoke to clear and the dust to settle and for us to begin to do an accounting of the events.
Back in June 1941, well-meaning observers might have been terrified at the prospect of the Germans escalating the war by attacking the USSR. 20 million soviet citizens would go on to pay the ultimate price, but without Operation Barbarossa, Nazi Germany could have gone on to win the war. Whether the resulting outcome was good or bad is another matter, and goes back to the initial question: who knows? One thing we do now is that current events are just the chickens coming home to roost following European crimes from centuries past.
So onto the present day. Perhaps a greater war with Iran, Hezbollah and Syria will erupt. Perhaps this will force Russia and then China to join in. I have no idea what the human cost will be but I know it will be heavy. It won’t be up to me whether those countries decide to pay it, but if it leads to the dissolution of Israel, and perhaps even the United States of America, then so be it.
Returning to the Patrick Lawrence article from a few days ago, Israel has to go. It has to go the way of Nazi Germany and Apartheid South Africa. The successor state will be an Arab-majority democratic Palestine but there needs to be a reckoning for the genocidal elements of Israeli society without which integration will not be possible. Modern day Nuremberg trials, perhaps set in Jaffa.
I’ve had similar thoughts and conversations. The difference that makes me uneasy is that Germany in the 40s didn’t have nukes.
Yes, the price to pay is terrifying. The only consolation is that Israel can’t nuke its neighbors without also poisoning itself. But if any society is mad enough to do that, it’s Israel.
“Ukraine’s Zelensky says he wants Russia ‘at the table’ for next peace summit”
That’s going to be a neat trick. Zelensky changed the Ukrainian constitution so that it is illegal to negotiate with a Putin government. Even if he does, the Nazis have already told him that they will kill him if he tries to do so. And on what basis will he negotiate about? His 10 point peace plan which the Russians rejected on sight? Putin’s recent offer? Apparently he wants it held near when the US elections are to be held so likely the whole point of the conference would be to make the Russians look bad and generate good headlines for the Democrats to use in their political campaign. And for some reason, Zelensky still thinks that he can get China to order Russia to halt this war. Meanwhile he must be sweating bullets at the thought of Trump winning in November.
Mother Nature’s punching bag
Orange dots are buildings.
Yellow is river corridor
A ski mountain in Vermont:
I tried to include a link to a 3D look, but the link failed
https://mfs2.github.io/Ludlow/
It would be a shame if Ismail Haniyeh did not know that Israel has a long history of assassinating Hamas negotiators. He might have lived longer had he not made peace proposals.
Excellent/detailed long comment on polling/survey companies, here:
https://old.reddit.com/r/ireland/comments/1egt4gu/more_than_a_fifth_of_voters_believe_government_is/lfxmcno/?context=3